India ifunda.

Long back, I attended an upskilling program, titled Siyafunda, in South Africa. Siyfunda in Zulu language means “we are learning”. The term doesn’t mean a plain-vanilla act of learning. It connotes a profounder way of negotiating life and its ways through constant learning. Around 140 million people in India can read, write and speak English with varying degrees of proficiency. More and more are learning the language as India extends its reach globally. But Trump, aided by his courtiers, has got us confused big time. Not about the English language or its grammar or its vocabulary. But about a hitherto unfamiliar reality that words or terms or sentences may have fundamentally different meanings in different contexts in Trump-ian English. Seeking meanings to suit his own convenience, Trump has pushed us back to dictionaries to check if the terms “tariff” or “funding a war” or “profiting” have been redefined since 20^th January, 2025 the day his second term was inaugurated. Last I checked, classical definitions of these terms remain unchanged. Probably its Trumpian semantics that’s at play here. To Trump and his courtiers, India ifunda (Zulu for “India is learning”).

Television interviews & debates. Newspaper articles. Podcasts. Posts on the social media. Blogs. Microblogs. I searched all. From mundane to sublime. Trying to know the reasons for imposition of penal-tariff on India by Trump. Ironically, I scouted around for the reasons knowing fully well the reason paramount. Trump’s bloated ego, silly. I sifted the net for the pearls of new-found wisdom on the subject that may have been acquired and shared publicly by the courtiers like JD Vance, Marco Rubio, Scott Bessent, Lindsey Graham, Kashyap Pramod Patel and Peter Navarro. To no avail.

 The back story.

Since the onset of Russia-Ukraine war in 2022, an embargo has been imposed by the European Union, the G7 countries and Australia on maritime import of crude oil and refined products from Russia. The embargo is not total. To ensure stability in the energy market, oil imports from Russia are allowed but with a price-cap. The underlying objective is to dent Russia’s revenues from oil and, by implication, limit its financial capability to continue with the war. All to note two distinct dimensions of the embargo. One, the embargo was not imposed by the United Nations, the most appropriate forum for the purpose. The other, contrary to the impression created by Trump and his courtiers, nothing prevents countries from buying crude oil from Russia as long as the price-cap is maintained.  

 The India angle.

Russia offered to sell crude oil to India at discounted rates, below the price-cap, and India availed itself of the offer. So, what is the issue. Is it that the purchases only by India generate revenues for Russia which are used in the war against Ukraine. Or is it India buying crude oil from Russia, processing it, selling petroleum products to the world and profiting from it. Trump found both reasons appealing to project India as the one aiding and abetting the war. So, one day, during a you-scratch-my-scrotum-and-I’ll-scratch-yours session (euphemistically called a meeting) in the White House, Trump and his courtiers decided to peddle grossly misleading narratives against India on these two counts. A billion-ruble question remains if India is the only country to import merchandise from Russia. Other countries, especially those which are party to the decision to impose the embargo, need to come clean on their own purchases from Russia and explain the contradiction.

The tariff and the penal-tariff.

I have never been as unsure before of my understanding of the word “tariff” as now, despite my background in economics and business management. As regards imports from India, tariff is a levy by the American government. Who pays it, the American importers. Who collects it, the American government. Who bears the impact and the incidence of tariffs, American consumers. Similarly for the penal-tariff. In a nutshell, Americans pay and America collects. But Trump, questioning the intelligence of his own countrymen, pretends as if India is paying the tariff and he is merrily filling up America’s coffers. Trump needs to gather some courage, stop hiding behind the penal-tariff and admit that he wants to hurt India (for the reasons personal to him but known publicly) by pricing its merchandise out of the American markets. Will he succeed in this. The answer goes both ways. If, post-tariffs, American importers find cheaper alternatives, other things being equal, they will stop sourcing from India. If not, they will continue to import from India but at higher landed costs in which case its Americans who will pay higher prices, not India. As regards the Indian merchandise which form inputs to American exports, the country runs the risk of having a cascading effect on the prices of its exports. As India’s hand has been forced by Trump, it has quietly started looking for alternative markets for its exports including export of refined oil and pharmaceuticals which will surely hurt American consumers. 

 India funds the Ukraine-Russia war !

Trying to unravel the funding mystery, India must recite Amir Khusro’s famous couplet to Trump which says Bāt agam keh dīnī re mose nainā milāike (You’ve said the unsaid secrets of divine nature, just by a glance). Trump acted à la Judas Iscariot in letting the world in on a highly classified secret that it is India behind the war. But the masculine in me is pumped up about my country for being credited, howsoever foolishly, with the capabilities to fund Russia which is pitched against Ukraine (backed, overtly or covertly, by USA, UK, EU and NATO). India must be doing something right. My countrymen join me as I thank Trump and his courtiers (especially Peter Navarro) for announcing arrival of India.  

What is the issue? India buys from Russia and pays for the purchases. So do Germany, France, Italy, Netherlands, UK, China and even the USA. If purchases by India generate revenues for Russia to fund its war against Ukraine, so do the purchases by other countries. Why, then, lay the blame at India’s doorsteps and single it out for penal-tariff. Does anyone expect Trump, a cerebrally-challenged person, to be so Trumpish as to penal-tariff all. Certainly not. Though well within the realm of a farcical possibility, this American Nero could have penal-tariffed the American importers of minerals & metals from Russia. How about Europe and UK for importing mineral fuels and oil ? No, they are subserviently friendly and white. What about China ? No, they have testicles-crushers in the form of critical rare earth metals and magnets. So, what is this penal-tariff on India. Unadulterated hypocrisy. The world knows that the real reason is Trump’s inability to reconcile to the reality of a recalibrated India that emphasizes its sovereign status and insists on making its own decisions.    

Making a complete ass of himself, Trump doles out a bizarre argument that it is the revenues generated from purchase of crude oil (by India) that funds Russia and not the revenues from purchase of rare earth minerals, mineral fuels, metals, etc. (by many other countries including the USA). Indians can only empathize with him for his inability to find any substantive argument against India.  

India profits !

As India is fully compliant of all conditionalities of the embargo, the issue of profiting from crude-oil imports from Russia cannot be an argument against India. Hellbent, Trump and his courtiers added a new dimension of ethics to the issue and wanted the allegation of unethical profiting to stick to India any which way. Intoxicated with past successes in pressurizing nations through false narratives, they decided to be clever by half and, first, started a whisper campaign. Later, a jailbird (masquerading as a trade advisor), Peter Navarro, was tasked to that end. Navarro, an over-the-hill  economist, is the same person who was convicted by the District Court of Columbia and sentenced to imprisonment last year. He started at the hatchet job in right earnest. Note the bitterness and frustration in his statements. “India’s oil trade with Russia carries an added price of blood and devastation in Ukraine”. “Indian refiners buy cheap Russian oil, process it, and export fuels to Europe, Africa, and Asia-shielded from sanctions under the pretence of neutrality”. “You have got Brahmins profiteering at the expense of the Indian people, and we want that to stop.” “Shame to see Modi getting in bed – the leader of the biggest democracy – with two biggest authoritarian dictators, Putin and Xi Jinping.” He was at the peak of senility when he called the conflict Modi’s war.

India is the 3^rd largest oil consumer in the world and depends on imports to meet nearly 85 % of its requirements. Russia decided to sell oil to India at deep discounts which enabled India to presumptively save nearly USD 17 billion over the last three fiscals. It’s ludicrous that an out-and-out transactional and a self-proclaimed deal-maker like Trump has objections to a business deal between India and Russia. India’s imports are predominantly to meet its domestic energy requirements. India also processes and value-adds to crude oil and exports refined petroleum, diesel etc. to various countries, Lo and Behold, including Ukraine and the USA. Interestingly, India turned the largest source of diesel for Ukraine (in war with Russia) as recently as July-2025. The hypocrisy gets compounded when the USA doesn’t want to talk about its own imports of refined petroleum, fuels and oil from India to the tune of USD 7 billion in 2024.

What is troubling Trump and his courtiers. Is it India profiting from its imports of refined petroleum, fuels and oils. If that’s the case, he is welcome to stop America’s own oil imports from India. Also, he should instruct Zelensky similarly but after finding him a country to replace India for supply of diesel. If Trump wants to play the ethics card of deaths and destruction in Ukraine, he should first stop exporting arms to the countries engaged in bloody conflicts domestically or with foreign adversaries or export terrorism on America’s behalf. One is reminded of a paper brought out by IBON Foundation which says that the USA’s acts of aggression have resulted in some 7-13 million deaths due to direct military action and another 6-10 million deaths due to armed conflicts supported or instigated by it. The countries which buy arms from Trump, kill thousands of fellow humans and which the USA hugely profits from. He should stop , at the least, arms exports to these countries but he wouldn’t. Its business for him, silly. Coming from a hard-core “business” person, all objections to India’s business calls are nothing but absurdity.